Toward the end of shootaround Friday, Los Angeles Lakers guard Steve Nash approached Dwight Howard and offered up a couple of tips on how to shoot free throws.

Though Howard is shooting just 46.9 percent from the foul line this season, while Nash is tied with Mark Price for the best free throw percentage in NBA history at 90.4 percent, the Lakers center said he's had enough of people giving him advice.

"Listen, he was just suggesting some things, but it's not something that we've already talked about or anybody else has suggested," Howard said. "My mind cannot get clouded with everybody telling me how to shoot a free throw. I just have to go up there and shoot it my way and not get caught up in what everybody else is saying, because that's when I miss."

Later in the article Kobe defends him and says he sucks at FTs because thats how he was raised playing basketball where it was ignore and they just told him to sit in the paint and dunk and what not.

Dwight's form isn't the worst I've seen. The problem is that he doesn't have any rhythm. Also his eyes. If you watch his eyes, he's basically hoping that the ball goes in. So his confidence isn't there either. No rhythm. No confidence. It doesn't matter what kind of form you have.

revgen wrote:Dwight's form isn't the worst I've seen. The problem is that he doesn't have any rhythm. Also his eyes. If you watch his eyes, he's basically hoping that the ball goes in. So his confidence isn't there either. No rhythm. No confidence. It doesn't matter what kind of form you have.

Yes, it isn't the worst. Anyone remember Chris Dudley's? Howard's follow-through isn't smooth as if he is flcking the ball towards the basket. It looks choppy and short...

It could also be something with his eyes as well. If he's right eye dominant and the ball is covering up his dominant right eye, like it is in the picture, his issues could be stemming from that as well.

Rule of Thumb at ClubLakers - Never encourage people to check your post history.

Forget the knees, his elbow is not rising through the shot. Right now, his elbow doesn't move, and he's just trying to flick it with his wrist. The elbow needs to move up, and at the top of his shot, the elbow should be fully extended. This give you consistency and makes it easy to repeat, your elbow goes from bent to fully extended every time. Shooting is a combination of muscle memory, technique and rhythm. He needs to sit down with a real coach who can dissect the wrist action needed to be consistent in shooting. The elbow needs to move up, while it is doing that, the wrist needs to snap to increase the rotation of the ball. Do that for 500 times a day, and over a summer...you should introduce that memory into your muscle...and make these shots consistently. It's not sometime you just pick up overnight.

If Steve Nash is offering to help you, you should be thanking your lucky stars and learning as much as possible.

If you're going to take 1 thing & say it's the reason for Dwight's poor FT shooting, it's that he doesn't take it seriously. Holding the ball in front of his face, not moving his elbow, not bending his knees correctly, all things he could easily correct if he put in enough time to build the muscle memory.

Doc Brown wrote:It could also be something with his eyes as well. If he's right eye dominant and the ball is covering up his dominant right eye, like it is in the picture, his issues could be stemming from that as well.

Doc Brown wrote:It could also be something with his eyes as well. If he's right eye dominant and the ball is covering up his dominant right eye, like it is in the picture, his issues could be stemming from that as well.

Would you mind refuting my statement? Why wouldn't covering up your dominant eye when looking at a stationary object not effect his shot? Or how essentially shooting with one eye covered, does not effect your shot?

Go on, I'll wait.

Rule of Thumb at ClubLakers - Never encourage people to check your post history.

His attitude towards his FTs problem is the same as towards the game : he doesn't care too much and I don't see the " I want to win regardless what it takes" factor ... as of now I can't say I would lose any sleep if he left at the end of the season

Doc Brown wrote:It could also be something with his eyes as well. If he's right eye dominant and the ball is covering up his dominant right eye, like it is in the picture, his issues could be stemming from that as well.

Would you mind refuting my statement? Why wouldn't covering up your dominant eye when looking at a stationary object not effect his shot? Or how essentially shooting with one eye covered, does not effect your shot?

You didn't answer my question. And providing evidence of something happening once, that doesn't even explain the question at hand is hardly a rebuddle.

It isn't something that happened once. MJ would practice this - in order to trust the fundamentals. Dwight's fundamentals aren't solid, and he doesn't trust his shot either. Nothing to do with vision, more to do with fundamentals.

Great game the other night. So much for Perk containing him, right? Haha. It's going to be even worse for OKC's interior when we have Nash distrubting the basketball & creating. He's a monster. He's rounding into form.